Storage battery.



No. 895,549. PATENT'ED AUG. 11, 190s. Y

f G. A. T0111);

STORAGE BATTERY.

APPLICATION FILED 0GT.27, 1305.

zsnnnTLs-sxnnn. l r

//////////////// www i- .1.... n. Uw. H TH T 70 z, l@ j r L I v im la, n 1----- ..I il

2 BBIEETB-SHEBT 2 Lum-:MEDr AUG. 11,1903,

T i I,. ...l Q l E l MT AG. A. FORD STORAGE BATTERY.

APPLICATION FILED 00T 27, 1905 UNITED strar srarnnr onirica.

A \k y i GEORGE A. FORD, OF CLEVELAND, OHIO, ASSIGNOR TO HARRIET S. FORDWOF CLEVELAND,

To all. whom zt may concern:

Be it known that I, GEORGE A. F om), a citizen of the United States, residing at Cleveland, in the county of Cuyahoga and State of Chio, have invented a certain new and useful Improvement in Storage Batteries, of which the following is a. full, clear, andexact description, reference being had to the aecompanyi ng drawings.

T iis invention relates to storage batteries of the type shown and described in my prior patent i o. 655,769, granted August 14th, 1900.

The objects of the invention are to increase the capacity of such batteries, to reduce their weight, and to diminish their' eost. These objects are attained. by reason of certain novel cooperating characteristics of the trays and of the electrodes, as will appear in the followinfr description and the annexed drawing.

In tlie4 drawing Figure 1 is a front elevation of a storage battery embodyiiw my invention, the containing jar being s iown in section, and the two upper units being also shown in sectioii,-tl1e upper unit being sectioned in the plane indicated by line 1--1 of Fig. 3 and the unit next below it being sectioned in the plane indicated by line 2 2 of same figure. Fig. 2 is a transverse sectional view of one of the battery units in the plane indicated by line 3 3 of Fig. 3. Fig. 3 is a lan View of one of the battery units. Fig. 4 is a bottom view of one of the trays B. Fig. 5 is a side elevation of said tray. Fi?. G is a plan view of one of the reinforcing spider-like frames which may be used; and Fig. 7 is a side elevation of the same.

The battery is made up of any desired number of superposed unitseach unit consisting of a tray and an electrode and act-ive material contained therein,--the stack or pile of units being contained in a suitable jar or receptacle A. It will be understood that any desired number of such units may be employed, and that they may be of any suitable configuration. It will be understood that the trays and electrodes may be of any size and contour to meet the requirement-s.

Each of the trays B has an approximately vertical marginal flange l); and the bottom of the tra y' inclines slightly upward from some vcentral point. to saidY flange, l) this inclination being for the purpose of facilitating the escape of gases generated iii said tray. These trays STORAGE.

\ Appiicatioii filed october 27, 1905.A seria1No.2s4,s19. l 1 l OHIO.A

Specification ofLetters Patent.-

Patented Aug. 1 1, 1908,'.V

ar`e\to be made of some infra-ngible absorbent material, such as wood, wood pulp or paper pulp,` and they may be made of an of the forms of pulp from which various 'inds of paper are made, or they may be made from ieavy paper or )aper board, or even from wood veneer. If made from nul is plastic. If made from heavy paper or'pa.- per board the material must be inoistened 'and made plastic in order that it may be pressed into shape. If the trays are made of wood veneer it must also be subjected to such treatment, well understood in tlie\ rt, to render it capable of being molded int shape.

There are many advantages growing out of the use of the described tra s; fo\r\ example, they cannot be broken; t ey are very much lighter than the trays heretofornsed in batteries of this type; and they are so very absorbent of the battery liquid that when immersed therein they offer comparatively but little resistance. to the current flow..

They have also certain disadvantages, for example, the acid battery solution will in time disintegrate them, unless the material employed in constructing said trays is acid proof. I have, however, obtained excellent results in such storage batteries by using tra ys made from ordinary paper board. Such trays have retained their sliaie and usefulness after being immersed in the acid batteryl solution for many months. Acid proof paper and paper pulp are, however, well known in the paper makers art, and such ma terial may be use dif desired. Speaking generally, it may be said, however, that such material is not so porous as some of the other materials mentioned which are not acid proof. Therefore, the acid proof material offers more resistance to the current flow and is less desirable from this standpoint. i\[oreover, the rlp-turned marginal edges or flanges of these trays are lia-ble, when immersed in the battery solution, to lose their strength and to fall over orliatten out, thereby defeating the purpose for which they are provided. This action may be substantially prevented, however, by reinforcing these `marginal flanges. They may, for example, be reinforced by impregnating them with paral'lin or as haltum, or some other analovous materia which not only stiffens them but also renders the-m substantially non-ab- A they'are molded into the desired shape whi e the pulp' sorbent. Another nieans for satisfactorily lreinforcing the marginal franges of these' trays is to employ a skeleton frame on which the bottom of the tray will rest, which frame F is provide-.l with an tip-turned marginal flange f against which the outer surface of the flange of the tray may lean. This frame must, of course, be inade of some material which will retair.l its shape during use,

the-currenttothose parts of the bottom of Tiese bosses are the tray which lie upon the parts of the supporting frame. There is, therefore, a question, whose answer largely depends upon the use to which a battery is to be put, whether it is better lto so increase the weight and internal resistance for the ui'pose of increasing the durability of the attery, or to provide a less durable battery which weighs less and has less internal resistance.

All things considered, I believe that for ordinary uses' the' preferred construction includestrays made of acid proof pulp, with their marginal flanges reinforced by being 'impregnated with asphaltuin and having on their bottom several downwardly projecting integral bosses. ln each of these trays B is laced a coni bound electrode greatly resemling that which is shown in my pending application Serial No. 217,344. There are certain differences, however, which will be presently explained. On' the bottom of each of the t-rays are depending bosses b', which, when the battery is assembled, rest u on the. electrodes of the unit just below it. preferably rnade integral with the trays. They may, however, be separate spacing pieces, as at b2 Fig. 1, which may be made-of pulp, or wood and are preferably made of such material because then they do not greatly increase the internal resistance. They may, however, be made of other material, not bibnlous, in which event they will serve the purpose of properly spacing the elements, but will increase the resistance and thereby entail a certain loss in capacity'. Then they are made integral with the trays, they strengthen them, and therefore this is the preferred construction.

Each one. of the electrodes is made of two plates, namely; the. plates D and E. Each has a central longitudinal web (indicated by tl and e respectively) and laterally extended wings fl and e formed by transversely slitting the plate between this rib and thc inarginal edges and twisting the parts between the slits, up in the case of the bottoni plate, and down in the case of the to i plate. The marginal edge of the bottoni plate is turned up forming a flange e2. The marginal edge d2 'of the top plate serving ineasnrably as a cover, which prevents any of the active inaterial from passing overthe top of the flange into the tray. Not only therefore is the active material prevented vby the trays from falling from one electrode. down to another, but by reason of the described construction of the electrode, said active material is ineastirably held between the two plates and in intimate contact with thein.

I claim:

1. A storage battery unit consisting of a tray inolded from paper pulp having a reinforced upturned marginalflange, a bottom which inclines upward from a central point toward said flange, and integral bosses extending downn ard from the bottom of said tray, and an electrode in said tray.

2. A storage battery unit consisting of a tray made of infrangible absorbent material having an npturned reinforced marginal flange and an electrode in said tray consisting of two plates each having a plurality of vanes and the bottoni plate having an upturned marginal llange and the top plate having a marginal edge wlnc li rests upon the top of said marginal flange, the vanes of said two )lates intermeshing substantially as describe 3. A storage battery unit consisting of a. skeleton frame having an upturiied marginal flange, a trayinade of infrangible flexible absorbent material and having an upturned marginal flange, which tray is fitted to and rests upon said frame, and an electrode within said tray and supported thereby.

'ln testimony whereof, l hereunto aflx iny signature in the presence of two witnesses.

GEORGE A. FORD. llfitnesses:

ALBERT H. Barras, E. L. TnUnsToN.

rests upon this flange, 

